Foxx needs a 'time out' to figure out how to the right thing

It's human nature to make mistakes and then cover them up, lest they be revealed to our family, friends, co-workers or whoever we want them hidden from. We don't like losing face, being embarrassed, appearing incompetent, being less than perfect. We all do it all the time. But when a public official makes a big mistake at the beginning of a high profile case involving waste of the city's manpower and finances, then covers up the first mistake with mistake after mistake, we must ponder that official's competency to remain in office, much less seek re-election next year. 

Such is the fate that has befallen Cook County States Attorney Kim Foxx in her handling of the likely false hate crime reported by celebrity Jussie Smollett. Foxx has staked her reputation on bringing a new paradigm of justice to the minority community long neglected by the entranced powers of justice. She has accomplished much and needs to achieve more. But she cannot proceed along her laudable path of reform unless she provides the full, unvarnished recounting of every step her office took that let a relatively simple case of a likely false police report spiral away from a prompt resolution that would uphold the public trust. This isn't complex but it does go against one of the strongest impulses in the human psyche. If States Attorney Kim Foxx wants to get back to completing the task she was called to do by first herself, then the public, she simply needs to do the right thing in the now unending case of Jussie Smollett.